"We encourage people to vote on that day," township supervisor Dennis Keiser said.

The ordinance that voters will be asked to accept or reject was approved in late 2002 by the township board to serve as a replacement for an interim zoning document used earlier.

But a group of township residents and property owners - some of whom raised concern that ordinance content is too restrictive in various ways - collected the hundreds of petition signatures needed under Michigan law to place it on the ballot for voters' consideration.

With the interim zoning ordinance having expired in January, control over zoning matters in the township has reverted at least temporarily to Emmet County officials, who handled such needs in Bear Creek until the late 1990s.

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The ordinance which voters will consider would make various changes to the map of land-use zones in Bear Creek.

Parts of the farm-forest zone which has covered much of the township's southern end, for example, would be redesignated as rural residential land, with township officials seeking to better reflect the type of development occurring in those areas. Areas where agriculture, forestry and similar uses are well-established would remain as farm-forest.

Several zones that have existed along the growing U.S. 31 North commercial corridor are consolidated into a single general business zoning designation in the new ordinance.

Township planning commission chairman Joe Hoffman Jr. noted that commissioners and others worked more than a year to develop a "zoning ordinance that looks to our future."

The proposed zoning guidelines seem well-tailored to the township's land use concerns, like situations in which commercial growth occurs in close proximity to residential areas, he added.

"The need for it is because of all the growth that has occurred," Hoffman said.

Members of a group calling itself Citizens for Fair and Reasonable Zoning, however, have criticized various parts of the ordinance in several fliers circulated around the township over the past few months - some of which urge a "no" vote regarding the document - as well as at township meetings.

Their areas of concern have ranged from the ordinance's standards regarding outdoor lighting to an increase in the minimum lot size needed for home construction - from 44,000 square feet to 88,000 square feet - under some circumstances in the proposed rural residential zone.

"The new Bear Creek zoning ordinance represents a major surrender of property rights and individual decisions to an unelected board, the planning commission, and to a hired zoning administrator," said attorney John Ternes, who has a law office in the township and has worked with Citizens for Fair and Reasonable Zoning. "It is often vague in the standards or requirements for using property or making a change."

Ternes added that approving the ordinance would present the township with a variety of expenses, like staff to administer and enforce the zoning regulations as well as the possible cost of legal defense from lawsuits.

"The whole country is facing an onslaught by zoning lovers to control the lives of the people through the mechanism of zoning," he said. "Perhaps here in Bear Creek, 'it has gone too far.' The county zoning ordinance is restrictive enough."

Hoffman and township clerk Judy Mays said some of the ordinance provisions which critics of the document have brought to their attention may need further consideration. But they added that the document as a whole would serve the township's land-use concerns well - and could be amended if concerns arise in the future.